


This Purple World

by Electra_Heart



Category: IT (2017), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Angst, Comfort, Dysphoria, Genderqueer, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Transphobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-09
Updated: 2017-12-09
Packaged: 2019-02-12 17:44:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12964917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Electra_Heart/pseuds/Electra_Heart
Summary: Richie climbs through Eddie’s window during a very inconvenient time.





	This Purple World

**Author's Note:**

> Hey hey hey! It’s been a while since I’ve posted stuff, so here’s some Reddie. This was basically just for me to get my feelings out, so yeah.  
> If you like my writing, support me [here](https://ko-fi.com/meltingkingdoms)

     The first time Eddie had done it, he was four years old. There was this big, billowing chiffon skirt his mother always wore, and he liked it because he could hide in the folds, and clutch at her thigh when he was nervous. The fabric was a lovely shade of lavender, peppered with tiny daisies. To Eddie, the skirt was synonymous with comfort – it smelled like his mother’s deodorant, and it felt cold against his cheek when he pressed his face into it. Some children carried around blankets, or teddy bears, or dolls. Eddie carried around his mother’s skirt. But only in the house.  
     He can’t remember the exact train of thought he’d had at the time, only that there was this... _impulse_ that he had given into. For the first time, he wondered what it would feel like if he just _wore_ the skirt. It would certainly be easier to carry around than just dragging it about the house and filthying it all up (his mother hated how he did that).  
     Four-year-old Eddie stood on the step stool in the bathroom, and slipped the skirt over his head. He found that if he fastened the waistband tightly under his armpits, the skirt functioned as a sort of summertime dress. He turned to the side, observing his reflection in the tiny vanity mirror. The skirt was tent-like in its enormousness. (He could just hide in it forever and live in this big purple world).  
     He stepped off the stool and gave an experimental twirl. The skirt rippled like water. It was pretty. Eddie smiled.  
     He’d never quite gotten rid of that fucking impulse. At first, he’d just wear the skirt, certain that it was the skirt in particular that made him feel so _safe_ and... _real_ every time he wore it. But then he started getting drawn to other things. Things he knew he shouldn’t enjoy. At age five he’d spent two hours in the bathroom experimenting with his mother’s bright red lipstick. There was a little sticker on the bottom that said ‘Ruby Woo’, and Eddie thought to himself, _I’m Miss Ruby Woo. Eddie who? I don’t recognize that name._  
     After that, he couldn’t quite shake the nickname either. It was almost worse than all his weird desires to mess around with his feminine tendencies – he’d started referring to himself as ‘Ruby Woo’ in his head, like a dirty little secret only he was in on.  
     His mom didn’t really remark on it. By the time he was old enough that this sort of behavior would have been concerning, he’d learned to hide it. He learned mean, dirty words like ‘faggot’ and ‘queer’, learned that at home, behind his bedroom door, he was a faggot. _Ruby Woo was a fag_. Dressing up wasn’t fun anymore. Getting all dolled up and putting on his mother’s cloche and high heels stopped being comforting, and started becoming reasons to panic. In class, he could feel Henry Bowers’ eyeballs burning holes into the back of his skull – attempting to read his mind. If he didn’t stop this Fag behavior, Henry and his friends would manage to find out – they always did. And then they’d beat him to a bloody, gross pulp and leave his remains out on the sidewalk to fry like a pancake, and disgrace his legacy by telling every person in town that Eddie Kaspbrak wore dresses and Liked it.  
     Eddie stands in his bedroom, right in the center. Everything in his room is in its place, its drawer, its shelf. Meticulous, not a speck of dirt or dust.  Everything is cast in the soft glow of his reading lamp, framed by the blue nighttime shadows. His sheets are pulled over his mattress tight enough to bounce a dime off of. His schoolbooks sit on his desk in order from tallest to shortest. And in the center of his rug, Eddie stands, in his mother’s knee highs and blouse. The socks are so long they reach his upper thighs, and the extra black fabric swims around his ankles. The blouse is wide and pale pink, with big puffy sleeves, and fits like a dress.  
     Eddie hates how good he feels. He hates that dressing like a girl feels _right_. He hates that this is his only way of feeling comfortable in his own skin.  
     Eddie sinks down to the floor, pulls his knees tight against his chest, and cries. He cries, and it’s ugly and loud and painful. His face is hot and his brain is thumping at his skull. His fingers are tight around his knees, bloodless with their strain. He quiets himself down a bit, doesn’t want his mother to hear.  
     Amidst his own miserable sniffling and sobbing, he hears an owl hooting outside. The sky is a dark blue, the color of navy denim, and the moon isn’t visible. The tree outside his window bends and twists under the will of the heavy wind gusts. The leaves rustle, and it sounds like they’re whispering about him.   
     If the trees could speak about everything they’ve seen over the years, Eddie would definitely be shut up in the upstate looney bin. Left to rot in a straight jacket, only to break the lonely existence with some rounds of electroshock therapy. _Zap away the gay_.  
     Eddie chuckles at this thought, and the sound is garbled with the thickness of his voice. He doesn’t want to think, as if thinking might give him a sore brain the way sobbing has given him a sore throat.  
     He wants to sleep in his mother’s fancy blouse and socks and feel good and happy and complete. He just needs to set his alarm clock a bit earlier so that he can change tomorrow morning before she gets up.  
     He’s just finishing adjusting the alarm time, when his window slides open.  
     “Hey Eddie!! I found my Christmas presents in the garage and my parents got me the new limited edition Batman and I was so fuckin’ excited I was just like, man I gotta show Eds– wait, is that a blouse?,” Richie asks, his head cocked to the side like a lost puppy. He’s straddling the windowsill, one knee flush against Eddie’s desk, the other leg out of sight and dangling behind him over the side of the house.  
     The freezing December air cannot cool the burn of Eddie’s cheeks. He stands, rigid, unable to answer or move or do anything. His head is screaming, scrambling to find some way of reacting. But he can’t. He just fucking stands there, wishing, hoping, silently begging god to allow the ground to open up and swallow him.  
     “Why in the world are you wearing a ladies’ blouse, Eddie?,” Richie asks again, his words slow, as if he were trying to work through what he’s seeing, not quite able to comprehend any of it.  
     “I-I. I don’t know,” Eddie squeaks, staring at the floor. His face is so hot it feels like it might just melt right off. God, he wants to fucking die right here, right now. “I don’t k-know,” he says again, more clearly this time. And then he begins to ugly-cry yet again. Big, honking sobs that wrack his whole body, his nose red and running, his eyes getting filmy, vision blurred to a dull mess.  
     Richie is still halfway through the window, completely at a loss of what to do. Whenever Eddie cries, it’s usually because of a scrape or something. Never anything like... this. There’s this strange feeling in Richie’s chest, a ballooning instinct to protect Eddie, to erase all the pain and worry contorting his face.  
     Richie climbs the rest of the way through the window, shakes the dirt off of his coat and jeans, kicks off his boots. He turns and closes the window as carefully as he can – the last thing they need is an angry, half-asleep Mrs.Kaspbrak.  
     Richie sheds his coat and places it around Eddie’s shaking shoulders. Even in the dim lamplight he can see the goosebumps on Eddie’s chest and arms, his body reacting to the outdoor draft. Eddie tries to swallow past his hysterics, creating the most pitiful choking sound Richie has ever heard.  
     At a loss of what to do, Richie does the only thing he knows _how_ to do without fucking up. He hugs Eddie, carefully, securely, as if Eddie were made of stained glass and paper mache.   
     Eddie’s breath hitches, and he burries his face hard into the dip of Richie’s shoulder. He closes his eyes, letting his tears gather and stain Richie’s sweater, letting his head fill with the warm, uncomfortable pressure of sobbing, letting his body go limp. Letting himself cry about this... this _thing,_ for once.  
     Eddie doesn’t know how long they stand there like that, awkwardly embracing in the center of his bedroom. But eventually, his thoughts seem to return to him, and all over again he realizes what he’s wearing, what he looks like.  
     He pushes Richie away, wanting to scream at him to _get out! Leave!_ , but not having the willpower to do so. He swears he can feel their friendship collapsing. And it hurts.  
     “Do you hate me,” he asks meekly. It’s stupid as hell, but it’s the only thing he can manage to say.  
     “What the fuck?! No!,” Richie says, shocked and a little bit hurt that Eddie would even think that. Eddie’s eyes get all glassy again.  
     “Aw fuck, no no no,” Richie mumbles, silently kicking himself for being so _loud_ and _forward_ with his words.  
     Eddie hiccups, knees collapsing. He perches at the edge of his bed and swipes at his eyes till they’re raw and stinging.  
     And then Richie is fretting all about him, wiping the tears from Eddie’s cheeks with the soft sleeve of his sweatshirt, clutching at his elbow and waist as if Eddie might disintegrate if he lets go. Shushing him, patting his back.  
     “I would never hate you, Ed’s. You’re... you’re my best friend,” Richie says, and the sentiment surprises him more than it seems to surprise Eddie.  
     Eddie gives him a tiny, watery smile, and Richie’s chest squeezes tightly. His thoughts stop for a second, and he’s overcome with a feeling he doesn’t have words for. And then the smile is gone, and Eddie is staring down at the carpet.  
     “So you don’t...you don’t think I’m a f-fag?” he asks, unable to look at Richie. His Best Friend.  
     “I mean, I’m surprised, and a little confused, but, um. No. Honestly that...word... didn’t even occur to me,” Richie says. He sits down beside Eddie, hugs him gently. He feels Eddie settling into the gesture, finding normalcy in their companionship again.  
     Except now, there’s that no-name feeling that’s making Richie’s head spin a little, and his stomach is flipping and he sort of wants to throw up. It’s not anything gross like _love_ , but it’s somewhere in that ballpark. Maybe, _dare he think it_ , it’s _attraction_.  
     Part of Richie wants to stand permanently between Eddie and the oncoming freight-train of life, and the other part, the scary part of him, has this teeny tiny, nearly invisible desire to know what Eddie looks like under that blouse. Not that he hasn’t seen his friends undressed before – like, there’s gym class where they all change in front of each other, or when they go swimming or get their clothes dirty down at the Barrens. But maybe he wants to know what Eddie looks like when he’s taking off that blouse?  
     He lets go of Eddie. He feels wrong, his brain is tumbling down a very dangerous rabbit hole. Eddie looks up at him with round, glazed, sad eyes, and it’s not fucking helping anything. Richie gulps and does the only thing he can do without feeling like a creepo. He ruffles Eddie’s hair.  
     Eddie laughs, and he leans into the touch. His laughter dies down.  
     “Pinky-Promise you won’t tell anyone?,” Eddie asks softly, holding his pinky out.  
     “I Pinky-Promise swear on my mom. Richie says, curling his pinky around Eddie’s. Then he thinks about it. “Okay maybe not my mom. But I swear I won’t tell anybody.”  
     “Thanks,” Eddie sighs. “Thank you. I...I get it, if you think I’m weird or you don’t want to hang out anymore–“  
     “– what’re you saying?? Didn’t I just tell you that you’re my best friend?”  
     “–yeah but”  
     “– but what? I meant it, Eds,” Richie says fiercely. “You’re my best friend in the universe and you could dress up as a fucking banana in your spare time and that still won’t matter to me.”  
     “I-I,” Eddie stammers.  
     “Do you understand that?,” Richie asks. There’s a hint of desperation in his tone.  
     Eddie nods.  
     “Y-yeah.” A pause. “I just, you don’t think I’m weird, right?”  
     “I mean, I don’t really get it, but I don’t think you’re a weirdo or anything. I sorta...just don’t understand?” Richie says. “Maybe you could explain it to me?”  
     Eddie doesn’t say anything.  
     “Or, like, not right now, obviously, like, maybe another time?”  
     Eddie nods slowly. Richie gently pats the top of his head.  
     “Where’s that pretty smile, Eds?,” he grins.  
     “Don’t call me Eds,” Eddie huffs, but his mouth is curled into the beginnings of a smile, and it’s a start.  
     “Okay, fine. Goodnight, Eds,” Richie says, and pulls him quickly into one last hug. He plucks his jacket off of Eddie’s shoulders and slips it on, yanking the window open and moving to climb out.  
     “Oh and by the way,” Richie calls over his shoulder, “those socks make you look hot.”  
     Eddie’s mouth gapes with the lack of an answer.  
“Goodnight, Richie,” he says, when he’s found words again. The curtains swirl with the breeze. Richie is already gone.  


 

**Author's Note:**

> [My tumblr](https://melting-kingdoms.tumblr.com/) . Come say hi!


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